User reviews

I Wake Up Screaming is an odd and oddly satisfying film. It is in the noir mold but it's a little earlier than most. The studio that made it was not noted for making thrillers, and the stars,--Victor Mature, Betty Grable and Carole Landis--were not the types one would expect to find in this sort of dark movie. Yet it is fun from the start to finish, and at times creepy, thanks mostly to the presence of Laird Cregar as a cop determined to nail Mature for the murder of a heartless showgirl that he, Cregar, was himself infatuated with. The studio New York of the film is much less intimidating than one might expect in a mystery, and overall the tone is bright and bouncy,--call it noir light. But it's Mr. Cregar who makes the film work. He dominates the picture as soon as he enters it with an authority and sense of himself that most actors would kill for. Cregar was, in short, a genius. The supporting cast, which includes Allyn Joslyn and Alan Mowbray, make the best of their lines, which are often quite witty, and the script is, overall, far better than average.

When the model Vicky Lynn (Carole Landis) is found murdered in her apartment in New York, the promoter of sports Frankie Christopher (Victor Mature) becomes the prime suspect of Inspector Ed Cornell (Laird Cregar) and is brought to the precinct for interrogatory. Christopher discloses how he promoted the career of Vicky when she was a waitress after making a bet with his friends Robin Ray (Alan Mowbray) and Larry Evans (Allyn Joslyn). After reaching the stardom, Vicky tells Christopher that she would leave him to go to Hollywood and on the next day, she was killed. Ed Cornell insists that Christopher is the killer and frames him, and Christopher can only have the support of Vicky's sister, Jill Lynn (Betty Grable), who has fallen in love with him. Who Killed Vicki?

"I Wake Up Screaming" is a film-noir with a story of unrequited love and obsession and "Over the Rainbow" as the music theme (after "The Wizard of Oz" of two years before). Laird Cregar is scary in the role of Inspector Ed Cornell and the final twist surprises and is well resolved. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Quem Matou Vicki?" ("Who Killed Vicki")

A pretty waitress is given a shot at the big time by a handsome sports impresario. She grabs her chance with alacrity, but Fate has plotted a different course for her ...

Bruce Humberstone directs this attractive early noir with a strong sense of visual style. His Director of Photography, Edward Cronjager, works wonders with elongated shadows and labyrinths of lattice.

Victor Mature looks good as Frankie Christopher, the romantic lead. Always a fairly limited actor, he never the less captures his character's ambivalence sufficiently well for the viewer to be kept wondering about him until the final reel. But for all Mature's efforts, Frankie remains a lightweight. He spends more time onscreen than anyone else, but remains in the viewer's memory less successfully than the other three leads.

After almost a decade in films, Betty Grable was 25 years old in 1941 and already an established star when she took on the role of Jill Lynne. Her character has psychological depth, and Grable does justice to the part. Jill is the slightly staid older sister of Vicky the glamour girl. While Vicky gives free rein to her every whim, Jill suppresses her id, but her yearnings are simmering just below the surface.

Of course, those legendary Grable legs have to be put on display, and we get three glimpses of Hollywood's most-insured thighs - first when the two sisters flounce around in robes, discussing the letter, then when Jill accompanies Frankie to the Lido Plunge, and finally when she is tottering up firescapes and over rooftops in her high heels.

Inspector Ed Cornell is a figure of stature, apparently a good guy, but one who fills the viewer with a sense of uneasy foreboding. Laird Cregar captures brilliantly the bleakness and creepiness of Cornell, the cop who starts the movie as a silent shadow, but who grows inexorably to dominate the proceedings. The moment when Jill meets Cornell for the first time is a very dramatic one, just as Vicky's first encounter with the eerie detective was disturbing. Robin Ray (Alan Mowbray) breaks down under interrogation, and Cornell's stillness as the suspect sobs is rather unsettling. "You're not a cop looking for a murderer," Cornell is told, and we become increasingly aware that this repressed man is conducting some kind of unhealthy personal crusade. It is only at the very end of the film that Cornell displays any emotion, and then the floodgates open.

Carole Landis, the ill-starred actress who plays Vicky Lynne, deserves a special mention. Like her character, whose fictional tragedy she paralleled in her own life, Landis was a victim of her own beauty. A tough but brittle radiance, total self-absorption and an impatience with the trappings of success ("I've got about as much privacy as a lingerie mannequin!") are Vicky's salient attributes, but could be said to apply to Landis herself. She gives a confident performance and sings beautifully. Like Vicky, she shot to instant fame but never found love, and died in her 20's. Thus does Life imitate Art.

The film contains some errors and improbabilities, but these do not seriously detract from the viewer's enjoyment. Cornell gathers evidence (such as discarded cigarette butts) with blatant disregard for preservation and continuity. That Harry should pack Jill's things, ready for her to move out, is just plain weird. The Assistant DA (played by Morris Ankrum) rides Cornell far too hard, given the detective's peerless reputation - and would the lawyer have direct operational command over a detective anyway? Frankie is allowed to compound felonies, and threaten cops, with impunity. Unbelievably, the police grant him the freedom to crack the case, even though he is the main suspect.

Music is used effectively throughout. "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" (the hit from the recent 'Wizard Of Oz') is Frankie and Jill's love theme. Vicky's signature tune is a wonderfully decadent jazz melody, brassily scored. Plot points are nicely underlined by discords in the incidental music, and during Cornell's final speech, Vicky's theme is reprised with great poignance and beauty on a muted trumpet.

We do not normally associate film noir with humour, but this one uses jokes well, both to punctuate the plot and to add a little light to the shade. Watch for gentle little gags involving latch keys, a Tootsie Roll, the girl at the Lido Plunge and a fold-away bed.

"You've got a heart made out of rock candy," Vicky is told, and in life the hard young woman is an unsympathetic character. Death transforms her, and she haunts the remainder of the film like a sort of ghost, her photograph adorning walls and bedside tables, more appealing in reverie than she ever was in the flesh. There is no help for it, Vicky is gone for ever. The question is whether those who loved her can continue to live without hope. "It can be done," intones the nihilistic Cornell.

Just for the record, though two characters are startled out of sleep by bedroom intruders, nobody in "I Wake Up Screaming" wakes up screaming.

As it originally emerged, Film Noir was as glossy as it was tough, a genre photographed in a remarkable visual style of light and shadow and offering cynical and often witty tales of slick anti-heroes and dangerous dames--and films like THE MALTESE FALCON, THIS GUN FOR HIRE, MILDRED PIERCE, THE BLUE DAHLIA, and DOUBLE INDEMNITY remain great classics of their kind. At the same time, however, 20th Century Fox was releasing a stream of "pulp" crime dramas. Often overlooked or flatly dismissed by critics, they would pave the way for the shift in Noir style that came in 1948 with the "true crime," gritty style of NAKED CITY.

The first of these 20th Century Fox films, based on a novel by Steve Fisher, was I WAKE UP SCREAMING. Jill and Vicky Lynn (Betty Grable and Carole Landis) are two sisters living in New York; Vicky is working as a waitress when she is noticed by promoter Frankie Christopher (Victor Mature), who is soon convinced he can turn her into a star. But Vicky proves perfidious: once success is within her grasp she drops Frankie to pursue a career in Hollywood. Her career never comes to pass: she is found dead in her apartment, Frankie standing over her. And police inspector Ed Cornell (Laird Cregar) makes it clear that he intends to nail Frankie for Vicky's murder.

Although the dialogue is clunky, the film structure is intriguing, often telling the story through flashbacks in a way upon the 1944 LAURA would improve. But the real power of the film is the sharp edge with which director H. Bruce Humberstone endows the film--and the truly memorable photography by Edward Cronjager, a truly gifted cinematographer who would receive no fewer than seven Oscar nominations during his long career. And then there are two powerhouse performances that drive the film: Carole Landis and Laird Cregar.

Originally from Wisconsin, Carole Landis began her career playing bit parts in such films as A DAY AT THE RACES--but in 1940 she had a major breakthrough in the film ONE MILLION YEARS B.C. In hindsight, it is obvious that Landis was a competent if slightly limited actress; at the time, however, she was generally dismissed by critics as just another pretty girl without significant talents. In a very real sense, I WAKE UP SCREAMING would be the high-water mark of her career; she was thereafter generally overlooked by the studio and often miscast. By 1948 her career was over, and she took her own life.

Laird Cregar, however, was a different matter, immediately recognized for his gifts. But Cregar was an extremely large man, weighing in at 300 pounds. It was a fact that limited his career, and although he appeared to tremendous effect in such films as THIS GUN FOR HIRE, HEAVEN CAN WAIT, and the exceptional THE LODGER, leading man status eluded him. Determined to cross the line, Cregar went on a crash diet and dropped over 100 pounds. It got him the lead in HANGOVER SQUARE, which many regard as his best film--but it also strained his health to the breaking point, and he died of heart failure in 1945.

In spite of its innovations, the fiery performances of Landis and Cregar, and an unexpected plot twist that can still drop jaws today, I WAKE UP SCREAMING is a slightly awkward film, largely due to the flippant nature of its dialogue and the "goody goody" quality of the role assigned to Betty Grable, who reads here as somewhat saccharine. Nonetheless, this is a film that fans of Film Noir cannot afford to miss, for it points the way to the new style. The quality of the picture is a bit hit and miss, but the DVD has a surprising number of bonuses--including a memorable audio commentary by film historian Eddie Muller. In comparison to such contemporary films as THE MALTESE FALCON and the slightly later LAURA, it is pretty mild stuff--but the film has a historical importance in terms of the Noir movement, and fans of the genre will find it indispensable. Recommended.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Victor Mature, Betty Grable, and Carole Landis had all been in movies together (mostly musicals) in various combinations, but I WAKE UP SCREAMING (IWUS) was the first film noir all three of them starred in. Maybe that's why IWUS still feels so fresh; everyone in it and everything about it brims with verve and brio, as if all concerned were eager to start filming. Though the movie begins in a NYC police interrogation room (an effective change from the novel's Hollywood setting), IWUS's plot starts more like PYGMALION/MY FAIR LADY than pulse-pounding crime fiction like the Steve Fisher novel the movie's based on. Flashbacks show how promoter Frankie Christopher (Victor Mature), newspaper columnist Larry Evans (Allyn Joslyn), and veteran actor Robin Ray (Alan Mowbray) grab a bite at a Times Square eatery and end up betting they can turn their tart-tongued but beautiful waitress, Vicky Lynn (the incandescent Carole Landis), from a hash slinger to a headliner by getting her name in the papers and her face plastered all over town. It works *too* well: dazzled by her own success, Vicky snares a Hollywood screen test and contract right under her shocked benefactors' noses, only to be murdered on the eve of her Tinseltown departure. Jill finds Frankie standing over Vicky's body, swearing he found her that way. Hotshot Police Inspector Ed Cornell (Laird Cregar) insists Frankie's lying. 15-year veteran Cornell has never been wrong, and he's obsessed with making an example out of hapless Frankie. But does justice alone explain Cornell's zeal, or does he have a hidden agenda? The cat and mouse game is afoot between Frankie, determined to prove his innocence, and Cornell, a smoothly sinister behemoth of a man, ready, willing, and able to go to any lengths to railroad Frankie. Undeterred by the lack of a search warrant, Cornell even sneaks into Frankie's bedroom to watch him while he sleeps ("Someday you're gonna talk in your sleep, and when that day comes, I wanna be around."), doing his damndest to wear Frankie down with smilingly delivered threats and manipulation. With wily Cornell's festering resentment of Frankie, you can't tell what he'll pull next. A formidable, menacing presence, Cregar rocks in the role. His silky voice and charming smile somehow make him even scarier; no wonder IWUS put him on the map. Victor Mature's Frankie is a great match for Cregar's Cornell, with his outer charm and inner toughness. Always an appealing presence, Mature was a better actor than he got credit for, making it look easy. He was hot, too; no wonder Cornell sneeringly calls Frankie "Handsome Harry!" :-) Elisha Cook Jr. is fine as Harry Williams, the oddball switchboard operator and original suspect. (Fun Fact on film historian Eddie Muller's commentary track: Cook filmed his role as THE MALTESE FALCON's Wilmer at the same time he filmed IWUS.)

Things heat up as Jill and Frankie acknowledge what sharp Vicky had already realized: they're in love and eager to protect each other. It's cute and typical of the era to see Jill get starry-eyed when Frankie wants to marry her. It's even cuter when Frankie reveals his original surname as Jill dreamily sighs, "Mrs. Botticelli." Vicky's whirlwind trajectory from waitress to glamour girl to corpse plunges Jill into a world of murder, terror, and obsession, propelling her to flee with the man she loves, dogged by Cornell at every turn. When the plucky Grable's wholesome sexiness meets Mature's playful yet virile allure, it's Chemistry City! Dwight Taylor's screenplay tightens Fisher's sprawling novel almost to the point of claustrophobia (in a good way), with sharp, witty dialogue and comic relief balancing the nerve-racking tension. Taylor's dialogue is snappy, suspenseful, and poignant in all the right places. Loved that "key" exchange early on! Edward Cronjager's lush, expressionistic black-and-white photography is a thing of shadowy beauty, used especially well in Cregar's early scenes as combinations of heavy shadows and bright interrogation lights hide him from view.

Even with studio sets, IWUS evokes early 1940s NYC, even the rooftops. When Frankie shows Jill his old East Side neighborhood, it's fun as both a getting-to-know-you scene and a mini-travelogue of the non-touristy places where native New Yorkers go. This continues when the lovers become fugitives and Frankie shows Jill where to hide in the big city, including the library and a 24-hour grindhouse. Even the swimming pool scene has that spirit; sure, it's there primarily to show off sex symbols Mature and Grable in their swimsuits, but it reminded me of the city's neighborhood pools at their best. One ironic-in-retrospect bit, considering IWUS came out before the U.S. entered World War 2: incensed upon spotting Frankie and Jill dancing so soon after Vicky's murder, Larry calls in a blind item about them, snapping, "Scrap the stuff about the Japanese spy with the Kodak and run this!" Apparent nods to Fisher's pulp roots: 1.) Frankie takes Jill to The Pegasus Club, possibly a shout-out to the novel's narrator/writer hero, nicknamed "Pegasus," a.k.a. "Peg." 2.) During a Cornell/Frankie confrontation, a newsstand features Black Mask Magazine. (This scene gets my vote for cleverest use of a Tootsie Roll.) Finally, according to Muller's commentary, Cornell was named after Fisher's pal and fellow pulpster Cornell Woolrich.

Nice, quirky use of music, too, particularly "Over the Rainbow." Fans of vintage movie music will notice that the opening credits music is the same theme, Alfred Newman's "Manhattan Street Scene," also used in THE DARK CORNER. When Jill brings Frankie home to show him an incriminating letter, listen carefully: in the background, "Over the Rainbow" and "Manhattan Street Scene" cross-pollinate into a sinister new theme, courtesy of music arranger Cyril Mockridge. Ironically, although Mature and Joslyn each have scenes where they awaken with a start, nobody in I WAKE UP SCREAMING ever actually wakes up screaming! How could you wake up to find a huge cop staring at you and *not* scream? :-)

I Wake Up Screaming opens with both Victor Mature and Betty Grable being questioned by the police in the death of Grable's sister Carole Landis. Plausible cases could be made against them both, but the police let them go for lack of evidence.

One detective though is determined to see Mature get that fabled hot seat in Sing Sing for the crime. Laird Cregar is a cop with a reputation of never giving up, he'll get his man come hell or high water.

In fact Cregar has a devotion to the dead woman that amounts to a Laura like fixation that Dana Andrews had in that film. Although it looks like he wants to solve the case from almost the beginning of the film it's clear he has agenda all his own.

Other suspects in this film are Alan Mowbray, Elisha Cook, and Allyn Joslyn. Landis was quite the user of men and discarded when no longer needed. Any one of these and others could have had reason and maybe opportunity to do the job.

Grable and Landis would play sisters once again in Moon Over Miami, a much different kind of film than I Wake Up Screaming. Although in that one both are a pair of gold-diggers out for a rich husband.

The film really belongs to Laird Cregar who in his short life and career racked up an astonishing variety of roles. His detective Cornell is about as different as the epicene Curo from Blood and Sand as different as the luckless Willard Gates in This Gun For Hire and still different from the rapscallion prospector in Hello Frisco Hello.

One thing that I did not understand though it's a nice touch in the film. The background music is something Darryl Zanuck would have to have paid for. The two themes used are from other films not from 20th Century Fox. The theme from Elmer Rice's Street Scene which was from Samuel Goldwyn/United Artists is used as is Over The Rainbow from MGM's Wizard of Oz. Zanuck must have paid Goldwyn and Louis B. Mayer some big bucks for the rights.

I Wake Up Screaming did give Betty Grable a chance to shine in a non- musical part which she does. The rest of the cast does well and Laird Cregar just shines.

I've seen this many times over the years and never tire of it. The plot is a little bit predictable. But the details are what count.

It's like an Edward Hopper painting with dialogue, motion, and fabulously garish musical effects. Everything about it is seamy. Yes, the creepy plot but what a cast! Victor Mature and Betty Grable: These two were a couple to identify with? Not on a bet. They are as weird as Elisha Cook, always a pleasure to find in a movie, and the similarly excellent and mondo bizarro Laird Craiger. Carole Landis, a very likable performer who met a sad end in real life, was not exactly a wholesome beauty either. A beauty for sure but no sweet little thing.

The rest of the cast is great too. Alan Mowbry is icky in an understated way that is also as glaring as the theatrical lights blaring out the title at its opening.

And -- to be circumspect and give noting away: the shrine. The shrine will wake you up in days and years to come. Screams of horror; screams of laughter; screams of astonished appreciation for this one-of-a-kind cubic zirconium of a rare and unique gem.

Model Vicky Lynn is found murdered in her apartment and the police question the logical suspect, promoter (and slight love interest) Frankie Christopher who was the primary force who got Vicky her status. Vicky was a waitress in a diner who was noticed by Frankie (and two of his buddies- columnist Larry Evans and ham actor Robin Ray) and given the right contacts in the modeling and ad industry and was set to leave for Hollywood (and dump Frankie in the process) right before she was killed. Jill, Vicky's sister, is also questioned and while she seems to be protecting Frankie for some reason, she claims a large foreboding man was stalking her only to find out it's Ed Cornell, the police inspector, who becomes obsessed with the case and getting Frankie in the electric chair for some strange reason. Jill eventually begins to fall for Frankie and gives him a letter he wrote to Vicky in a fit of anger which Cornell swipes from him, but Jill helps Frankie escape. Frankie now tries to hide himself in New York from the police (especially Cornell) while trying with Jill to uncover Vicky's murderer. Great movie highlighted by the show stealing performance by Cregar (in probably his best role) as the sadistic and crazed Cornell. Mature, Grable, and Landis all give standout performances for their careers in this film as well. Humberstone's directing is the best it ever was with plenty of odd camera angles and surprises which the screenwriters gave plenty of. I still wonder why pieces of Over the Rainbow were used in the score. Great twist ending. Rating, 9.

Yes, I did, too, after my hemorrhoid operation. That was brutal, but has nothing to do with the title of this movie. Come to think of it, the title of this movie has nothing to do with the story of it, either.

There is no screaming in here, and almost no suspense. However, Laird Cregar, Elisha Cook Jr. and a couple of pretty ladies from the '40s (Betty Grable and Carole Landis) still make this interesting to view.

Cregar is creepy, thanks to his voice and some good film-noir camera angles. This is billed as film noir, but it's really a "whodunnit" melodrama and it drags in spots, hence the "fair" rating.

Overall "decent" but it doesn't live up to its wild title.

Evocatively directed by Bruce Humberstone, this absorbing early film noir contains a surface sheen, polished elegance, and haunting ambiguity that anticipate similar noirs by Otto Preminger. Its cast of unusual actors and all-time greats is uniformly excellent. Betty Grable is quite revealing and capable of expressing a genuine human emotion in the rare dramatic role of Jill Lynn, the sister of the slain victim Vicky (Carole Landis). Victor Mature looks suitable for his part. Laird Cregar (who would later play the Devil in Lubitsch's "Heaven Can Wait") may be the most memorable character in the film; he is truly scary as the corrupt detective investigating the murder case. Director Humberstone's way of handling the two disjointed flashback structures in the beginning, narrated by Mature & Grable in their two separate rooms is quite intriguing and masterful. The film has a way of surprising us with its captivating twists and revelations, never failing to arouse the viewer's imagination. One of the most enjoyable noirs of the 40s.

Seriously, I don't think I've ever seen a movie in which virtually every single character breaks and enters into someone's else's apartment at some point. Who knew it was so easy for people to just walk into other peoples' homes in 1940s Manhattan?

Aside from that, and the blaring soundtrack that bizarrely features an instrumental version of "Over the Rainbow" played over and over and over again, even as our heroine Betty Grable is laying down a wooden plank between the rooftops of two buildings so she can get across (and break into an apartment!), this is a tight noir thriller with excellent cinematography by Edward Cronjager, whose masterful use of light and shadows creates an eerie sense of tension and mystery.

The plot is simple. Trampy "hash slinger" Vicky Lynn (played by the tragic Carole Landis) is murdered in the apartment (that somebody broke into!) she shares with her sweet and virginal stenographer sister Jill (Betty Grable). Vicky's promoter and paramour, Frankie Christopher (Victor Mature), is framed, and it's up to Frankie and Jill to find the real killer and clear his name so they can get married and live happily ever after.

Mature is simply mesmerizing to watch. Although he didn't have typical leading man good looks, there's something about his physically imposing presence and his drowsy looking eyes that grip you. Every time he enters a scene, you're drawn to him. Grable plays against her pinup girl image, remaining fully clothed for most of the movie, except for a brief scene where she and Mature go swimming.

But the real star of the film is Larid Cregar as Ed Cornell, the dirty cop out to get Frankie. He oozes corruption and danger with every line he delivers.

Although the film delivers somewhat of a "twist" ending, it really comes as no surprise to any viewer with even a minimal attention span. Still, it's a fun movie to watch, and it's one of the first of the American noir genre. Worth checking out.

WWII pin-up gal Betty Grable took her first dramatic part as the sister of a murdered model in Bruce Humberstone's I Wake Up Screaming, based on a serialized novel by Steve Fisher. It sounds like second billing, but the victim's role – as coffee-shop hostess turned toast of Manhattan Vicky Lynn – remains curiously understated (and played by Carole Landis).

Landis is discovered by publicist Victor Mature and falls under his benevolent spell, which launches her onto magazine covers and ultimately to a Hollywood contract. She proves ungrateful and winds up strangled. Mature, among other suspects, comes under the scrutiny of the police, particularly of a dogged detective whose interest in the case borders on the obsessive. Portrayed by the immense but oddly vulnerable Laird Cregar, the detective becomes Mature's nemesis (in one scene, Mature wakes up to find Cregar watching him, hoping he'll incriminate himself by talking in his sleep). Cregar's ominous bulk makes for a number of looming shadows skulking through nighttime New York.

I Wake Up Screaming, which appeared very early in the noir cycle, certainly displays the dark look and fragmented structure of its successors, but its tone remains ambiguous. Basically, it's a high-style, `sophisticated' murder mystery, a precursor to the more famous and accomplished Laura. But, unlike Laura, it found many of the implications of the story perhaps too grim for wartime audiences – the theme of obsession gets played down, for instance. But it's a key work in the developing noir cycle, released the same year as Johnny Eager, The Glass Key and This Gun For Hire.

Eleven years later, the releasing studio, 20th Century Fox, remade the film as Vicki. Though changes for the most part were minimal, the title role was enlarged (and taken by Jean Peters) while Mature's part was weakened by routine casting. The most interesting change was engaging the young Richard Boone for the Cregar part, who delivers a more brutal portrayal and thus underscores the theme of sexual obsession. It could be argued that the remake, despite lapses in casting and direction, remains the more intriguing version.

A waitress (Carole Landis) discovered by a promoter soon has several men interested in her, but gets killed before getting on a train to Hollywood. The way the crime is solved isn't perfectly told and this noir lacks the crackling dialogue of others in the genre, but the cast is compelling and the cinematography is pretty good. I love Betty Grable as the sister who finds herself being pursued by the suspected murderer (Victor Mature); she oozes a mix of 1940's innocence and appeal on the cusp to her own stardom. Hot on the trail is an aggressive and obsessed cop played wonderfully by Laird Cregar, and it's a shame the actor would die at 31 just three years later. For these two alone, the film is worth spending 82 minutes of your time.

The Production Code tries to keep things clean in some ways (while being wined and dined, the waitress gives three different men a key to her apartment, but it's passed off as innocent), but the film manages to be pretty subversive in others (let's just say, the actions of the police). The moment of truth scene is very enjoyable, especially for 1941. The title doesn't fit the film at all given the plot, and I have to say, the soundtrack is a real lowlight, alternating between "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and the theme from Street Scene (1931), both of which work in their original movies, but not here. It's a lesser noir and probably best categorized as a B-movie, but I was entertained.

I never heard of director H. Bruce Humberstone before- he's not an immediately recognizable director of thrillers and particularly in the mood of film-noirs like Fritz Lang or Robert Siodmak or Otto Preminger to a degree- but after I Wake Up Screaming I'll try my best to remember it. He's directed an exemplary film, a B-movie that crackles non-stop with terrific, sometimes explosive dialog, and the actors- all cast against their usual genres at the time (and Victor Mature, a musical performer, who knew)- and retains its classic status as a more-than-whodunit.

Actually, the 'who-dunnit' part is both the least exciting and the most potent of the picture (yeah, contradiction in terms). Vicki Lynn has just been murdered, and Inspector Cornell (Laird Cregar) is out to bust the guy who did it - and that guy, right from the start, is sports promoter/slickster Frankie Christopher (Mature). At first it's cut and dry it seems, but then... ah, personality seems to go a long way in these stories, and this is where some directors might play for safety in the treatment of the plot and characters, but Humberstone follows along with it, makes the mystery exciting and curious for the audience. I've seen many of the quintessentially darkly-lit movies of the 40s, and this one still caught me up in the grip of suspense, the thick of not always so much who did it but what clue would slip up who, and at just what turn.

The dialog is one indicator of how continuously watchable I Wake Up Screaming is; the lines just between Christopher and Cornell, slinging barbs at each other and going in their molds of Christopher the wisecracker but tough (and claiming innocent) guy and Cornell the smug, slimy Inspector who, by proxy of a very underrated performance by character actor Cregar, becomes all deliciously more obvious as the picture goes on. And yet the writers know well: it's good to be witty, even sarcastic and with touches of grim humor or catchy one liners like, "Here, have a tootsie roll!" But it's also the acting all around, on top of the perfectly moody cinematography (the smoke in one room could be cut with a scalpel, and the contrasts of light and reflecting of lines of shade is remarkable), that makes this stand out, with Grable, Landis and especially Mature giving all they got.

Watch it in the dark, have no distractions, and get sucked into I Wake Up Screaming, a tale of a woman being sucked into the fantasy of showbiz, the possibility of two folks finding love together, and the lines of who's good or bad getting blurred all along the way. Pretty simple themes, but expressed wonderfully and with a tough sense of style, plus with an oft-repeated "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" rendition fitting in (sometimes) ironically in scenes. Basically, any self respecting fan of film noirs, or just brilliant B-movies, should see it.

Forget the sensationalist title, as while there's certainly some waking up here, (one scene of Victor Mature's character doing just that is certainly memorable), no-one does so screaming and you get a fine, early, at least for the recognised time-span of the genre, film noir with an interesting cast and strong direction overcoming the contrivances of the plot.

It all starts like a light comedy as three men in a bar decide to bet on whether one of them, talent promoter Frankie Christopher, played by a young Victor Mature, can set up their pretty but acid-tongued waitress, Vicky, played by Carole Landis, in high-society. As a plot line it Shaw feels familiar, but unfortunately this fair lady winds up dead setting up the basic whodunit premise of the film.

Vicky has a younger sister, the more grounded Jill, played by a young Betty Grable, who falls for fast-talking Frankie, even as he seems to be the cops' number one suspect, particularly in the eyes of the hulking police captain, played by the excellent Laird Cregar who's never lost a case and so takes against Frankie, for reasons which become clear as the film progresses, to the extent of stalking him, and using other highly questionable techniques too, to almost demand he own up to the crime.

Pretty soon Mature and Grable unsurprisingly find themselves on the run from the law and as you'd somehow expect find a way to crack the case themselves to expose the true murderer as well as levelling matters with the obsessive Cregar.

The plot fairly rattles along stopping only briefly and questionably when the two young leads end a night on the town by going for a midnight swim at the local indoor lido (as you do) which surely had to be an obvious excuse to get the muscular Mature and shapely Grable into swimming costumes. Both are otherwise appealing in their roles although personally I can visualise a young Frank Sinatra here in his namesake role, although possibly he just wasn't mature (groan!) enough at the time of casting.

Of course in retrospect, the film is haunted to some degree by knowledge of the early demises of Miss Landis and Mr Cregar, both in sad circumstances. I have to agree with those who say that Miss Landis, who committed suicide as a result of an extra-marital affair (on his part) with Rex Harrison, whilst very pretty and certainly a competent player just lacked that star quality to really break through as an A-lister, but I doubt you could say that about the formidable Mr Cregar. In a role redolent in more ways than one of Orson Welles' brilliant later portrayal of a similarly seedy, shady, crazed police detective in "Touch Of Evil", he commands every scene he's in as he routinely breaks into people's apartments without a warrant and acts as judge jury and proxy executioner of whoever he decides is the guilty party. I'm sure he could have been a long-term fixture as a character actor but unfortunately his reckless action in going on a crash diet ostensibly to garner him leading-man status ended up with a death by heart attack at only 31.

Despite a strange soundtrack which seems to feature 101 variations of "Over The Rainbow" for some reason, this is a high quality 'tec' thriller, atmospherically shot and well acted which deserves to be much better known.

BETTY GRABLE and VICTOR MATURE were not the likeliest contenders back in the early '40s to be appearing in a creepy film noir sort of tale dished out by Fox. Usually, they could be counted on for much lighter stuff--particularly Grable, who usually starred in Fox's gaudy Technicolor musicals. Mature only came into noir by '47 with KISS OF DEATH.

But no matter. It's really LAIRD CREGAR who gets the spotlight here as a detective relentlessly pursuing Victor Mature as the killer--hoping to snag him in his net--if he can convince anyone that Mature is the real killer. Mature's only relationship to the dead girl (CAROLE LANDIS) is that he's the one who was closest to her at time of death, being that he was her agent trying to get her a Hollywood career rather than letting her remain in obscurity.

So, it becomes a game of cat-and-mouse and full of plot twists and the kind of deception that easily turns up in any film noir or mystery of this kind. And the deception appears to be obvious, at first. But--well, you have to see the film to see how the worm turns.

It's nothing really special but it does provide a few shivers along the way. Some of the Grable/Mature romantic moments go on a little too long (especially at the swimming pool) and once in awhile the plot drags. But by the time it winds up, it's been a pretty smooth ride into noir territory, thanks largely to LAIRD CREGAR and the dark shadow he casts over the whole story.

I Wake Up Screaming (1941)

Elements of Noir, with Pulled Punches

This looks like a film noir, with Edward Cronjager behind the camera (a seasoned Fox cinematographer). The plot reads like one, with a good woman, a so-called bad woman, and a good man caught between. The nighttime New York setting is pure noir, nightclubs and all. And it has perfect actors for the job--Victor Mature as a fight promoter, Laird Cregar as an ominous cop, and Elisha Cook Jr. as creepy and afraid as ever. As a true film noir, it's about as early as they come, a prototype, really, before WWII has hit the U.S. directly and the final elements of the approach take form.

Though completely enjoyable, and an important film in the evolution of the genre, I Wake Up Screaming is not as intense or moody as it could have been. Director H. Bruce Humberstone, a veteran of Charlie Chan movies and later some weak Tarzan flicks, pulls a lot punches here. Dark moods lurk, but layered with lightheartedness. One reason is the lead actress, Betty Grable, a sweet, girl-next-door type, utterly likable but somehow oversimplified. And very blonde--that is, he works with stereotypes and doesn't dig beyond them (partly the screen writing at fault, though the actual dialog is good). (Grable is famous as the war's number one pinup girl, and Humberstone did a musical starring Grable three years later called Pin Up Girl.) And there is a steady stream of improbable or even absurd details (or mistakes) to mar our getting absorbed--the most jarring might be when the cop disappears into the swinging bed and the camera watches long enough so we laugh, just when we are meant to be tense and afraid. Slapstick? As well, a couple of bit-part actors take on clichéd roles in comic relief, which makes the film a bit undecided.

In a way, the movie has fun with the caricatures it's been dealt. It refuses to get serious and disturbing because it's so purely out to entertain. That might be a fault, but it might also be a matter of taste. At the time, the strategy may have paid off in ticket sales. Even so, people must have wondered really why the murderer wanted to kill the girl, or why the sister wasn't more upset about it, or why the fight promoter could so cheerfully run around as both crime-solver and main suspect.

The country was swept with "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" fever a year before this was filmed, and the song infects this movie to a fault--it is used so often for the Grable character's signature music, and yet it's so linked to the Wizard of Oz in our heads, it strikes you as false. And the last thing a moody crime film needs is a superficial falseness. But Humberstone also packs some wallop in many of the scenes, often with the help of hard light and slicing shadows, or with characters sneaking into people's apartments with alarming ease. And there is the steady sympathy aroused by the underrated Mature, who helps hold it all together.

The title is the most exciting part of this film, and it is a misnomer. It leads one to believe this may be a psychological mystery, but it is actually a pretty run-of-the-mill mystery with Betty Grable woefully miscast. She was good at dancing, not so good at acting. Victor Mature turns in a decent performance, and Laird Cregar chews the scenery as usual. The ending is supposed to be kind of a twist but it doesn't really work and seems rather contrived as most mysteries are. This may be classified as a noir film due to the camera work and obsessiveness of Cregar's character, but it is a very minor film and lacks any real substance. But in 1941, this kind of mindless fluff passed as entertainment and at least the actors were good-looking.